The Proposition
by merise
Summary: “Wait Scarlet, I’ve got a proposition. I’m here for a week before my plane leaves, and I really don’t have much to do until then. So let’s see if I can seduce you.” Egoshipping.
1. Chapter 1

Merry Christmas, Arsyd and LiliNeko! These two are my Egoshipping buddies, so it's only fitting I write an Egoshipping story for them. The story is going to be about 8 chapters-ish total? My goal is to finish this story by New Years, but I get super distracted when I write, so it might continue on until the next year.

This takes place sometime after the Ever Grande Conference, and before Gary heads off to Sinnoh..

The Proposition

A light chime signaled the door of the Cerulean gym opening. The redhead at the counter who was typing on her laptop when the visitor came in and proceeded to finish her sentence of the e-mail.

"Hey Tracey, give me a- oh, you're not Tracey." She blinked as she looked up. "Hi, Gary. I was expecting Tracey. Where is he?"

"Boyfriend number two couldn't make it. There was a last minute emergency with some of boyfriend number one's tauros." The guy shrugged as Misty crinkled her nose at him.

"First of all, 'boyfriend number two' is going out with my older sister, Daisy. You might have battled her while she was here? Second, Ash is not my boyfriend. And third, I thought you were on Saiga Island? That's what Professor Oak said last time I visited."

"Oh, I got back a few days ago. I'm heading over to Sinnoh after this, and I have about a week or so to kill. Since Tracey and Gramps were busy taking care of the pokemon- nothing serious, Scarlet- Tracey asked me to deliver the pokefood for him, since my boat leaves from Cerulean City anyways." He set the bag on the desk and she nodded before turning back to her e-mail.

"All right. Good to see you. Bye."

Ignoring her signal for him to go, he looked at the pictures sitting on her counter.

"So, Ashy-boy placed top eight again, eh?" He observed from a picture May had sent through mail. "I'm guessing you didn't go watch up close and personal?"

"No, I couldn't close down the gym for those days or the League would kill me. Daisy was going to take over for me, but they shipped her off for a talk show in Goldenrod and Violet and Lily were visiting Dorian at the Coastline gym and they couldn't get back in time. I did watch him compete though."

"And the brunette? His new traveling partner, I'm guessing? Is she a trainer like him?"

"Nope, she's a coordinator."

"Are you jealous of her?"

"Jealous of her traveling with Ash? No. Jealous that she gets to travel? Yeah. There's not really much to do at the gym. All the challengers are obnoxious ten-year-olds who want to be Pokemon masters. Sound like anyone you know?"

"Yup. And I'm guessing you're writing to him right now?" He moved around, over her shoulder to check her e-mail. "Yup. Dear Ash, I love you with all my heart and- ow!"

"Have you heard of privacy? Plus, I didn't write that." Misty raised an eyebrow before shutting her laptop. "Why are you still here again?"

"Nothing better to do, Scarlet."

"Whatever. You can go. I'm going to go feed the pokemon now." She said, heading towards the entrance to the pool. Gary quickly blocked her way and she gave him a questioning look.

"Wait Scarlet, I've got a proposition. I'm here for a week before my plane leaves, and I really don't have much to do until then. You said yourself that you don't have anything to do around the gym, and I figured we should entertain ourselves. So let's see if I can seduce you."

"Excuse me? I don't know whether I should slap you or not."

"Come on, Scarlet. I need a place to stay- my reservations fell through, and I'm going to die of boredom in the next week if I don't do something."

"And you can't just go out and try this on the other girls of Cerulean?"

"Like I said, I'm here for a week, so I don't want to jump into anything. It's perfect. You and I already know each other, you know there's no strings attached, and we'll get some fun out of it. Plus, I want to see if you really do like Ashy-boy as much as everyone thinks. What do you say?"

"Well, as a gym leader, I can't back down from a challenge. So I accept your proposition."

"Then let the games begin."


	2. Day 1

I knew I'd get distracted. Ah well. I do intend to finish this- when, however, is questionable. I've got the ending planned out and written already, I just need to fill in everything in between. Writer's block is so not fun though.

Day 1: Monday

By the time the sun had risen in Cerulean, Misty had already been up for an hour, tending for the Pokemon at the pool. She had never been much of a morning person, but since taking over the gym, she found that some things had to be done before the day started. Now, she came to enjoy her early morning routines since she got to spend so much time in the water (since Psyduck had yet to learn how to swim, and she had to make sure her own swimming wasn't rusty, in case her challengers fell into the pool and had the swimming capacity of logs- an incident she didn't want to repeat- the paperwork still made her cringe).

"Come on, Psyduck. You can get in the pool without your water wings." Misty pleaded to her pokemon. "Just hold onto the wall, that's all I'm asking, please?"

"Psy?" The yellow duck just looked at her with his blank face and the gym leader sighed, giving him his water wings.

"We'll try tomorrow then." She said as Psyduck jumped into the pool, contentment on his face. He started flapping around in an abstract form of butterfly (1), moving only by inches through the water, but happy all the same. Misty couldn't help but smile as she straightened up.

"A duck that doesn't know how to swim, I didn't think that was possible." A voice behind her chuckled.

Misty gave out a tiny yelp and turned around, simultaneously pushing the person behind her into the water. After seeing a brown head bob up and down, she remembered that Gary was staying at the gym.

_Whoops. Ah well, too late now, _Misty thought.

"Sheesh, Scarlet! Did you have to flip me into the pool like that?" Gary said as he made his way over to the wall. "Was that really because you didn't expect me or was it revenge on behalf of Ashy-boy?"

"Please. You and Ash's rivalry isn't mine." Misty rolled her eyes as she placed a towel on the edge of the pool. "And I forgot that I let you stay here."

"Pity, I thought the great Gary Oak would leave more of an impression."

"Nope. And seriously, was that how you treated your cheerleaders? If it was, I'm surprised they followed you around for so long."

"The cheerleaders came with the car." He joked as he pulled himself out of the water. "I came down here because I wanted to ask what was for breakfast."

"Oh, I usually don't eat breakfast." Misty thought for a moment. "Well, there's left-over take out in the fridge, as well as cold pizza. And there's cereal if you want that too. I'm going to take a shower and get changed. I've got stuff to take care of before the gym opens."

"No breakfast? Leftovers? Scarlet, what did you do while you were traveling?"

"Do you remember Brock?"

"Tall, tan, always on his knees after a girl?"

"Yup. He took care of all the domestic stuff, so Ash and I never had to do anything. I tried cooking my first day back, but the fire marshall came, so I've been out to eat ever since. It's not so bad."

"What did you too?" He asked, half in horror, half curious.

"Tried to cook eggs by putting them in the microwave, and burned soup." She shrugged. "It's not so bad, eating out and ordering. The places I order from are so used to me, they even add dessert, free of charge. Anyways, I'm going to get going."

Gary shook his head in disbelief as Misty left the pool.

x

"Oi, Scarlet, are you on lunchbreak yet?" Gary called as he walked into the gym. Misty glared at him, about to start her last battle before lunch. The challenger, a girl, who, was startled by Gary's presence and good looks stared at him, forgetting what she was in the gym for.

"Come on, Lili, don't pay attention to him." The redhead called to her challenger, who was still gawking at Gary. "You can have the first move."

"But he's Gary Oak! And he's so hot!" Lili said excitedly. "Can I join you guys on your lunchbreak?"

"Let's finish this battle first." Misty said, exasperated. "Gary, you get out of here! You're distracting my opponent!"

"If Gary Oak is going to be here, can I go on lunch break, then, Misty? My wife called me from work, and unless it's something important, she doesn't normally do that." The referee called. "If that's all right with you and him, though."

Misty sighed. "All right. Lili, you have to promise me you don't get distracted by him, and Gary, you have to promise you won't... uhh, be so distracting."

x

"You ruined the battle, Oak." Misty said angrily as she went over to her fridge for leftovers.

"How? You won the battle."

"But you being there got Lili so flustered, I'm sure she was a better trainer than that." She grumbled in response as she put a piece of cold mushroom pizza on a plate and set it in the microwave. "I'm just glad she's coming back. And hopefully _after_ you leave. You're definitely not on my good list right now."

"Enh, she was cute. And she'll learn to deal with distractions. And I never said I had to get on your good list, Scarlet, I just said I had to seduce you. Two different things. Ashy-boy wasn't on your good list for a while, and you still like him, don't you?"

Misty hissed a string of cuss words under her breath before realizing that Gary was just sitting at the table, no food in front of him.

"Aren't you hungry?"

"You concerned about me?"

"No, but you're still a guest, no matter how annoying you might be."

x

The rest of the day went well, as a whole, Misty noted. Gary had taken off for the afternoon, so there were no other 'Lili mishaps', as she called them. And another challenger had just barely won a badge off of her, and it was refreshing to see someone who put so much effort into training their pokemon versus the trainers who had just left their hometown (Cough, Ash, she couldn't help but think of). Sure, she didn't like to lose, but she did appreciate a good battle.

Misty had just locked the doors of her gym for a dinner when Gary showed up.

"Good day, Scarlet?" Gary asked. Misty glared in response as she wrapped her coat tighter around herself. "I don't suppose you're going to dinner?"

"Shut up. I'm still mad at you for what happened with Lili." She said grumpily.

"You didn't answer my question. Are you going to dinner?"

"Yes."

"Do you mind if I join you?"

Misty thought it over. On one hand, she didn't really want to spend any time with Gary, but she also didn't want to seem rude and a bad host.

"Fine. Anywhere you wanted to go specificially? Italian? Mexican? Chinese?"

"Italian sounds nice."

x

"Come on, Scarlet. You've been twitchy ever since we left the restaurant."

"Because you paid for the whole dinner. Plus tip." Misty hesitated.

"And what's wrong with that?"

"Well, it's sort of like you paying for a date." She said uncomfortably. Gary turned towards her and raised an eyebrow.

"Isn't that the purpose Scarlet? You haven't forgotten what my week's objective is, haven't you?"

"No, but, I just don't like people taking the tab for me. I always at least put up half and the tip. Well, unless you count the time that Ash and I had lunch in Pewter and I stormed off on him." She shook her head. "But next time, I'm treating you, okay? That's the only way I'll feel better about it."

"All right, Scarlet. I'll let you treat me to a date next time."

It wasn't until Misty was almost asleep when she realized that she had agreed to a second date with Gary.

**Gary**: 1. **Misty**: 0.

x ▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬ x

(1) Butterfly is one of the four competitive swim strokes. It's more arms than anything, and is the first stroke of an international medley (IM).

And end day one! What's Gary's plan? (I don't even know, hah).


End file.
